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159 



ELEGY IN AUTUMN 

IN MEMORY OF 
Frank Dempster Sherman 

BY 

Clinton Scollard 




NE^V YORK 

Frederic Fairchild Sherman 

MCMXVII 



Copyright, 1917, ty 
Clinton Scollard 






OEC -5 1917 



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ELEGY IN AUTUMN 



I 

Brother in song, you who have gone before 

Along far incommunicable ways, 
Leaving me here upon this mortal shore, 

A bondman to the tyrant nights and days, 
Across the distance, hail ! 
Though Time may sever, and we meet no more, 
Yet what shall Time avail ! 



II 

'Twas Autumn when we first set hand to hand, 

And eye to eye, in loyal comradeship; 
Drowsed with a draught of Beauty seemed the land, 
As it had raised a golden cup to lip; 
But you embodied Spring, 
Its harvest hopes, its deeds in joyance planned. 
Its brave adventuring. 



Ill 

I can recall your buoyance, — can recall 

The star-sown hours beneath the Cambridge trees, 
When o er us wheeled the bright processional 
Of bold Orion and the Pleiades, 
And how we strolled along 
Laughterfiil, and oblivious to all 

Save the sweet thrall of Song. 



IV 

Youth has its visions and its fervors; yours 

Were lovingly enlinked with Poesy; 
You dreamed the dream that many an one allures. 
The vernal dream where life is harmony. 
And though the years estranged 
Your full allegiance, something still assures 
My heart you never changed. 



V 

What merriment was ours those shut-in nights 

When Winter, clamorous at the casement, cried ! 
What dear association, what delights 
As we in friendly emulation vied. 
While Aspiration s cruse 
Was brimmed for us, beholding on dim heights 
The presence of the Muse ! 



VI 

And then there opened wider paths to tread 

When Love, with Song, beguiled you on and on, 
While Art around your feet unfaltering shed 
Its luminous light, irradiant as the dawn; 
Though you saw many part 
From deities long worshipped, you were wed 
Inalienably to Art. 



VII 

What though the rigid chains of circumstance 
Oft held you in the trammels of the town, 
Your heart went woodward where the fairies dance 
What time the moon its silvery sheen sifts down. 
You loved the reeds and rills, 
The sea, the shore, their glamour and romance, 
And all the climbing hills. 



VIII 

And when you made escape, and sensed the wild 

Aromas beat about you, when you fared 
By tracks unwonted, like an unleashed child 
You gleeftilly your gay abandon shared 
Care from your shoulders thrown. 
You seemed an Ariel spirit, long exiled. 
Come back unto its own. 



IX 

With gracious Memory again I go 

To tread with you where meads are green and gold, 
Where upland slopes are strewn with daisy-snow, 
And bee-balm torches light the flocks to fold, 
And willow branches wave 
Above Oriskany, singing far below 
Its liquid summer stave. 



X 

Now south we sail where stormy currents meet 
Round the wind-harassed cape of Hatteras, 
Beyond whose beacons, when the tides retreat, 
The wide sea-mirror is like bumished glass; 
There, mid the drowsy calms. 
As Ponce de Leon did of yore, we greet 
The tall Floridian palms. 



XI 

Here down the live-oak aisles 'tis ours to stray 

With wraiths of many a stem conquistador, 
Those vanished warriors of an elder day 

When gray San Marco bore the brunt of war; 
Here we in revery lean 
Upon the ramparts beetling o er the bay, 

And watch the shifting scene; — 



XII 

The boats that dip and dart like living things, 

Seeking the open sea beyond the bar; 
The graceful gulls with sunlight on their wings 
Up the Matanzas soaring fleet and far 
Where inlets deep beguile; 
And o er the water s undulant shimmerings 
The low coquina isle. 



XIII 

Then, at the drooping of the twilight hour, 
We wander in the ancient plaza where 
We breathe the attar of the jasmine flower 
Like incense on the altar of the air; 
And list, as music swells 
Down drifting from the old cathedral tower, 
The arpeggio of the bells. 



/ XIV 

We linger by the sea-wall while the tide 
Below us murmurs like a sad refrain, 
Bearing from outer ocean reaches wide 

The lore and legend of the Spanish main, 
Nor leave that spot serene 
Till Sleep, as with the mande of the bride, 
Wraps fair Saint Augustine. 



XV 

Days dedicate to rapturous things were these; 

It was as though Youth came again, and brought 
Past aims, past ardors and past ecstasies. 

And toward the shrine of Beauty tumed our thought. 
And there were after times 
Of exultation, prismic harmonies, 

When hours ran by in rhymes. 



XVI 

Once, mid cathedral Carolinian pines, 

We saw the Springtide, at its radiant birth. 
Kindle to fragrant gold the coiling vines. 

And make a garden of the wakened earth; 
And every moming heard 
Within the treetops, melody linked with mirth. 
The hidden mocking-bird. 



XVII 

And while the cardinal through the waving bredes 

Of pendulous moss swift flitted like a flame, 
Back flooded to our minds the illustrious deeds, 
Emblazoned on the honor-scroll of Fame, 
When Liberty was won, 
Hearkening the Ashley whisper to its reeds 
The name of Marion. 



XVIII 

From Gloucester cliffs and brown Nantucket dunes 

The mountains lured you, and the mountain star; 
For us the Woodland sang its lyric runes 
Where er we followed it, or near or far. 
In sun or shadow cool. 
Or loitered through long languorous aftemoons 
By Dian s darkling pool. 



XIX 

Far up the valley Wittenberg s vast form, 

Its summit beckoning, with you I view. 
And above sweeping slopes where wild bees swarm 
Glimpse timid deer at dawn and fall of dew; 
Through Panther Kill we roam. 
And mark the purple streamers of the storm 
Ascend behind the Dome. 



XX 

And, too, in bookmen's mines of dusty ore 
Ever shall I remember how we delved. 
Plucking from out the musty treasure-store 
Rich rarities within the darkness shelved. 
Elated if we found 
Leaves that some name we long had honored bore 
In frayed morocco bound. 



XXI 

Thus, step by step, we trod adown the years. 

Thus, side by side, with neer a break between; 
We shared our laughter and we shared our tears, 
Nor deemed inexorable Fate might intervene 
To sever the strong cord 
That bound us. Fate with its "abhorred shears,'' 
That is man s over-lord. 



XXII 

You that in Autumn came, in Autumn went; 

How vain to say the mourning word! how vain 
To beat the bars of that arbitrament 

That metes to mortals pleasurement or pain ! 
How vain! — how vain! — and yet 
We beat upon them, and we only gain 
The poignance of regret ! 



XXIII 

Autumn again with all its loveliness; 

Autumn again that brought an end to joy, 
Despite the sight of earth in amber dress, 
And airs that bear the blitheness of a boy! 
Autumn, and leaves that toss 
In bright brief triumphing, while they express 
The brooding sense of loss. 



XXIV 

Autumn again down every winding way 

That, in the days gone by, our footsteps pressed !— 
Instead of woven amaranth would I lay 

Above your dust — you gone by paths unguessed— 
Loves deathless asphodel; 
Until some happier hour, — when, who shall say? — 
Brother in song, farewell ! 



ONE HUNDRED AND FIFTY COPIES 
PRIVATELY PRINTED ON ITALIAN HAND? 
MADE PAPER DURING OCTOBER MCMXVII 



C 32 89 








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